The Feeling of Blue
by zethia
Summary: This time, his smile is the most real it's been in days. Gin/Rangiku.


The first night Rangiku comes to live with him, she's wearing the tattered blue kimono he'd first seen her in. She toes the threshold of the doorway, a small cloth-wrapped bundle clutched fiercely in her arms. She won't look him in the eye. Gin is just a little disappointed—the blue eyes are what he remembers best.

"You can come in, ya know," he says, and holds out a bowl full of dried persimmons. They're sticky and red as cherry blossoms in spring and slightly sweeter on the surface, the only way he likes them. Rangiku still doesn't move. "It's cold outside, Ran-chan," he says, resorting to an endearment he desperately wants to use. Rain is falling hard in District 64 of Rukongai, and after a few seconds of what seems like intense internal debate, she steps in and bumps the door shut behind her.

Gin waits for a while and takes bites out of a piece of persimmon. He's practically raised himself, and he is no stranger to waiting. He smiles, frowns, and smiles against just to see if it has any effect on the girl. The rain makes heavy plopping sounds on the cheap tin roof of the abandoned building, and finally Rangiku speaks. "Thank you, Gin," she says softly, in a voice that seems too small to be there, but is somehow still the only sound he can hear. "You are too kind."

"Aw, it's nice that you've come ta see me again, Ran-chan!" Gin smiles wide enough to show his teeth and takes her by the hand—better to be overenthusiastic, as long as he can get a smile on her face. "I found extra blankets. You can sleep over there!" Without looking behind him he gestures to the corner he's set up next to his own pile of worn bedding. He holds out the bowl of dried persimmons, deliberately presses one into her small hand. "You must be hungry—take one!" Her lips twitch upwards just a fraction of a degree.

In a way it makes him feel like an entirely different person, the whole guest routine—welcoming her in, showing her where to sleep, giving her food to eat. Yet it seems to come naturally to him as well. She's _his_ Ran-chan, after all, and she's _his_ responsibility.

One day cherry blossoms start showing on the trees, and Gin comes home with handfuls. He pokes them into Rangiku's hair when he finds her asleep in the corner and giggles to himself at the sight, a feeling that is by now not entirely foreign. As the weather grows warmer, Rangiku seems to be slowly melting as well. Gin notices that Ran-chan's blue kimono is matted with grass stains, and realizes that his own black robe has dirt pressed into the seams. Every day she smiles a little more, and gradually, Gin teaches her how to use sarcasm—his personal specialty. In return, it's Rangiku who eventually helps him learn how to laugh in sheer abandonment, rolling in this year's new spring grass like life will never end.

They are sitting on a quiet night when it starts raining hard again for the first time since winter. The clouds roll out over the blank Rukongai sky, and before they know it, plump drops of rainwater are leaking through the cracked seams of the building, spilling over the gutters, flowing in rivulets down the broken streets of District 64.

In his mind, Gin counts out the rhythm of the lilting staccato on the roof—it makes a pretty little lullaby. The sparkling of the raindrops casts a shifting pattern of shadow onto the floor, and Gin feels Rangiku's small hand press into his. "Gin?" she asks, in a voice that blends into the rain song running through his head. "Are we really friends?"

He casts a wide and generous grin in her direction, the curve of his pale cheek half illuminated by rain. "Of course, Ran-chan," he says, clasping his fingers around hers. "We'll always be friends. And we'll always look after each other, 'cause that's what friends do, ya know." She snuggles closer into him, presses her face into his shoulder. Gin can feel her heartbeat now, and the tip of her nose against his arm. He slides his other arm around her gaunt ribcage. "Friends always stick together, Ran-chan," he whispers into her red-gold hair, if only so he can hear the sound of his own voice between them amidst the driving rain. The constant rains of the Rukongai are far too easy to lose oneself in, and tonight Gin has no desire to lose his way. They fall asleep in much the same way as they spend their time awake playing, head against shoulder, his fingers tangled in her hair, one hand clutching the frayed sleeve of her old kimono. In the darkness, Gin thinks he can almost feel the blue.

The first time he leaves Rangiku it's purely by accident. Gin's gathering mushrooms in the tangled forest just outside the district outskirts when he finds that it's already late afternoon, far too late to head back without risking bloody fistfights in the streets. It's summer, so the ground is lush with moss that feels like pillows underfoot, and Gin lies down to catch a wink and tries to pretend his Ran-chan is there too. He misses her for the few hours she's not, but tells himself that he'll have fresh wild mushroom soup for her tomorrow when he gets back. And so Gin quickly learns to make bargains with himself: a night away from Rangiku in exchange for one of her smiles.

He's a fast learner, after all. Adapting is really not quite as hard as he thought it would be.

Gin's gone for a week straight but comes back with a kitten, colored orange like her hair, who takes to Rangiku almost immediately. "It's for ya when I'm not here, ya know," he tells her, feeling a surge of an overwhelmingly protective _something_ in his veins. She smiles a shy little half-grin that makes him want to leap with abandon, though Gin Ichimaru is really not the sort of person to really do that sort of thing.

The next time he comes back, with a new persimmon seedling this time, the good part of a month has flown by. Rangiku's changed—her hair is long now and shiny, and the blue eyes shine brighter. She greets him with a full-on hug, and Gin is loath to break away. He wants to stay with his Ran-chan forever and ever in this shabby home of theirs, but there's something else that he knows he must destroy before he can really sleep at night, and this something's name is Sōsuke Aizen. Eventually the nagging thought catches up to him: maybe it's actually he who's changed instead? He dismisses this: he is Gin Ichimaru, and he does not change.

Gin teaches himself to smile more and narrow his eyes, and his sojourns grow longer and longer. At first there's the constant and dull pain of not having Rangiku at his side, but he forces himself to smile through it, and the feeling subsides, leaving only a strange light feeling of numbness that makes Gin feel uneasy in a way he cannot name. Winter has just started when he remembers that Rangiku's birthday is in a week. He hasn't been home in two months now, but he knows his Ran-chan will be there for him as she always is, glowing golden, arms wide and eyes gleaming in delight.

Will she have changed? That's not even a question. Gin wonders how different she'll be from the last time he saw her—grown taller, maybe, filled out? Will her smile have gotten wider? He'd like to think so.

"Rangiku" is the name that is always on the tip of his tongue as Gin traipses home through muddy walks in District 64, whispering it repeatedly under his breath as a crazed mantra of sorts. He leaps from street to street, trying to take shelter under the tin overhangs of buildings to keep from getting soaked in the downpour. It's already half-dark, and right now he wants nothing more than to be in a warm place with his only friend. The sharp cold winds cut at his face, and Gin's smile wavers for just a moment. He forces his feet to keep moving through sludge and clutches the new kimono he's brought back tighter to his chest. It's blue, the color he likes best on Rangiku, with cherry blossoms embroidered onto the sleeves. The first and last time he saw the cherry blossoms with her just under two years ago.

When he opens the door, the scene is not what he expects: she's a small hunched figure in the corner, huddled among a mound of blankets, staring out the window at something that doesn't seem to be there. He can see the rain dripping into her hair, which lays long and lank along her back, the splashes of muddy water like scars running down the back of her arms. "Ran-chan?" he whispers softly, and her head turns imperceptibly in his direction, as if she has a faint recollection of his voice that she has mostly forgotten. Gin puts the wrapped package on the table by the door and goes to kneel down next to her. Something bitter and venomous inside of him strikes at his resolve, and he crumples. Gin puts his arms around her, and by degrees, Rangiku sinks into his embrace.

"Gin!" she finally exclaims after a few minutes, but her voice sounds exhausted, the shadow of a reflection of the hearty laugh he remembers from ages ago. When she turns her face toward him he realizes she's been crying—his Ran-chan's hollow cheeks are streaked with salt and dirt, and with one callused finger Gin gingerly brushes some of the wetness off. "Where are you always going, Gin?" she asks, and he can almost feel his strength crumbling from the inside out. He tries to smile and finds that his cheeks refuse to move. "Why don't you ever come back, Gin? I've been waiting for so long, Gin." Her fingers scrabble wildly at the tatters of sleeves on his arms, trying to find purchase on the faith that he is not sure he can give her.

Gins puts a finger to her lips and holds her closer. "Ran-chan," he says softly, for what he recalls must be the umpteenth time that day, "We'll always be friends, remember? You are mine, and I am yours." The silky words feel strange and foreign on his tongue, and inside he prays and prays that they are true. She is warm and soft in his arms, and he is weary and finally home.

"Happy birthday, Ran-chan," he whispers, once her breathing tells him she's asleep, and brushes his mouth against her cold chapped lips. This time, his smile is the most real it's been in days.

I count the days of my year around your birthday, he wants to tell her. I don't know how to miss you, Rangiku-sama, he wants to say, I don't think I can love you enough. The only time I can really smile, he wants to whisper into her ear, is when I'm with you. Instead he strokes her hair, the fine golden strands catching on the rough skin of his fingers. In the moments before his eyes really close, Gin's tired shoulders recall some murky memory from years ago when he held her in the same exact position, her golden head nestled in the crook of his neck. Maybe this will be the year, he thinks, when he'll finally stay to pick cherry blossoms for his Rangiku again.


End file.
